The Open Data Protocol is an open web protocol for querying and updating data. The protocol allows for a consumer

Consumer

Consumer is a broad label for any individuals or households that use goods generated within the economy. The concept of a consumer occurs in different contexts, so that the usage and significance of the term may vary.-Economics and marketing:...

 to query a datasource over the HTTP protocol and get the result back in formats like Atom

Atom (standard)

The name Atom applies to a pair of related standards. The Atom Syndication Format is an XML language used for web feeds, while the Atom Publishing Protocol is a simple HTTP-based protocol for creating and updating web resources.Web feeds allow software programs to check for updates published on a...

, JSON

JSON

JSON , or JavaScript Object Notation, is a lightweight text-based open standard designed for human-readable data interchange. It is derived from the JavaScript scripting language for representing simple data structures and associative arrays, called objects...

 or plain XML

XML

Extensible Markup Language is a set of rules for encoding documents in machine-readable form. It is defined in the XML 1.0 Specification produced by the W3C, and several other related specifications, all gratis open standards....

, including pagination, ordering or filtering of the data.

Many of the building blocks that make up OData are standardized via Atom and AtomPub

Atom (standard)

The name Atom applies to a pair of related standards. The Atom Syndication Format is an XML language used for web feeds, while the Atom Publishing Protocol is a simple HTTP-based protocol for creating and updating web resources.Web feeds allow software programs to check for updates published on a...

. The OData specification is available under the Microsoft Open Specification Promise

Microsoft Open Specification Promise

The Microsoft Open Specification Promise , is a promise by Microsoft, published in September 2006, to not assert legal rights over certain Microsoft patents on implementations of an included list of technologies....

(OSP). Microsoft has released an OData software development kit (SDK) consisting of libraries for .NET, PHP, Java, JavaScript, webOS, and the iPhone.

External links

• OData.org (official site)
• Hanselman Presentation